So Much To Do...So Little Time!

President Obama will give his State of the Union address tomorrow evening.  He is expected to talk about creating jobs.  This is a good thing because it seems as though he has talked about everything but jobs since his re-election.

He is expected to take a hard line on spending, gun control, immigration and tax reform.  If he draws a partisan line in the sand he does so at his peril, because his window of opportunity for compromise is very small.

The president has one year…eighteen months tops...to get his agenda passed.  Then congress will be much more concerned about surviving the mid-term elections than conducting the people’s business.  Once the mid-terms are over the president becomes a very lame duck with little political power at his disposal.  The 2016 presidential campaign starts right after the mid-terms.  Clinton, Biden, Christie, Rubio and a host of other wannabes will take center stage.

But first there is the little matter of the sequestration cuts that take effect on March 1^st.  And don’t forget the upcoming debate on raising the debt ceiling.

So much to do…so little time!

Pope Benedict XVI Resigns

Pope Benedict XVI announced that he would resign his post on February 28 ending his eight year reign as the titular head of the Catholic Church.  In a surprise announcement, the pontiff stated that his deteriorating health prevented him from continuing on with his ministry.  He is the first sitting pontiff to resign the office since 1415.  Then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger was  78 years old when he was elected pope by the Conclave of Cardinals; making him the oldest cardinal in history to take over the reins of the church.   

Pope Benedict’s legacy will be that he returned the church to its more traditional values.  In US political terms he would be considered a right wing conservative.  History will also judge him for handling of the church’s sexual abuse scandal.

Benedict is the latest in a long line of pontiffs to succeed the first pope, the apostle Peter, whom Catholics believe was appointed by Jesus Christ to head His church.

While this resignation will not mean much to non-Catholics; for the 1.2 billion who practice the Catholic faith it is a very big deal.  Catholics believe that the pope is infallible when it comes to speaking on matters of faith.  They will be looking to see if the new pontiff will take a more moderate stance on contraception, homosexuality and women in the priesthood.

The Conclave of Cardinals is expected to meet sometime in mid-March for the purpose of electing a new leader for the Catholic Church.       

Senate Hearings Produce Mixed Results

We watched John Brennan’s confirmation hearings and came away from the experience with mixed feelings.

On the one hand, it is a testament to our democracy that we should publically debate the taking of one American life without due process.  Even if it is the life of a sworn terrorist who has renounced his citizenship and joined with others to take American lives. While we personally trust this president to exhaust every other option before authorizing the use of drones; we are uncomfortable with allowing one individual to serve as prosecutor, judge, jury and executioner. The debate on this topic is healthy because it sets a precedent for future administrations.

On the other hand it was laughable watching Democrat members of the Senate Intelligence Committee as they tried to use Brennan’s testimony to rekindle their worn out attacks on the Bush administration.  They brought up “enhanced interrogation techniques” and tried to get Brennan to admit they were forms of torture.  The waved redacted documents and tried to get Brennan to admit that they were proof that Bush and Cheney took us to war based on a lie; all weak attempts to paint Bush and Cheney as war criminals and propagators of an unjust war.  As if any one of them had the balls to prosecute Bush or Cheney on these charges. 

The country already knows what went down in the aftermath of 9/11.  These same Democrats had the opportunity to prosecute various members of the Bush administration for violations of both domestic and international law, but they shrank from their responsibilities.  Now they look like petulant children, stomping their foot in anger…all an act for political theater.

Things weren’t going much better down the hall.  This time it was Republicans engaging in boorish behavior for the benefit of the cameras.  John McCain and his mini-me Lindsay Graham grilled outgoing Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta and Joint chiefs Chairman General Mark Dempsey on the events surrounding the attacks on the US Consulate in Benghazi.  Unsatisfied by the pound of flesh they carved from Secretary of state Hillary Clinton two weeks earlier, they honed in on Panetta and Ramsey with little affect. 

The answers are the same.  The consulate was lightly protected by members of the Libyan armed services as is the custom with most consulates.  The attack was essentially over before the closest US military forces could respond.  Previous requests from the consulate for additional security forces had gone unanswered and the state department officials who ignored those request were relieved of their duties.  There is really nothing new to discuss.  Yet McCain and Graham could not resist the opportunity to savage the Obama administration.

We applaud Senator Feinstein and the members of the Senate intelligence Committee for their thoughtful and appropriate investigation into the use of drones and the targeting of American citizens.

All the rest was just another example of what is wrong with Washington.          

             

Brennan Confirmation Hearings: The Right To Target Americans

“Now let me be clear: We are indeed at war with al Qaida and its affiliates.  We do need to update our institutions to deal with this threat.  But we must do so with an abiding confidence in the rule of law and due process; in checks and balances and accountability.  For reasons that I will explain, the decisions that were made over the last eight years established an ad hoc legal approach for fighting terrorism that was neither effective nor sustainable…a framework that failed to rely on our legal traditions and time tested institutions, nor that failed to use our values as a compass.”

These are the words that President Obama used in a speech at the National Archives in May of 2009 to describe the Bush administration’s decision to use enhanced interrogation techniques on suspected terrorist prisoners.

These same words could easily be used by the president’s critics to describe his administration’s decision to use drone attacks to target suspected terrorists…who also happen to be American citizens.

When then Senator Obama was campaigning for the presidency he promised to ban the use of enhanced interrogation techniques; which he viewed as torture.  He promised to stop the incarceration of suspected terrorists at Guantanamo without due process.  He promised to “regain America’s moral stature in the world.”

And then President Obama…like all newly elected presidents before him…received his first President’s Daily Brief (PDB) and learned what a dangerous place the world truly is.  Suddenly ideology gets a real cold dose of reality.

Clearly the hypocrisy between the president’s words in 2009 and his actions over the past few years is palpable.  Those who have supported this president will undoubtedly be inclined to give him a pass.  They are probably the very same individuals who called for Bush and Cheney to be indicted for war crimes.  Reality has a way of changing one’s tune.

We understand that this president is presented with a list of targets that the CIA wishes to eliminate.  We understand that this president has chosen to personally authorize each strike as a way of accepting personal responsibility and accountability for these life and death decisions.  In a world where most politicians are more than happy to pass the buck for weighty decisions such as these, we find the president’s actions admirable.  But while we applaud his willingness to accept responsibility, we are uncomfortable with the process of allowing one man to be judge, jury and executioner of American citizens.  We need to know more.  We don’t know what we don’t know.

Perhaps we will learn more today.

Today the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence will hold confirmation hearings on the nomination of John Brennan as Director of the CIA.  Brennan is currently the chief counterterrorism advisor to the president and the chief architect of the administration's drone program. Undoubtedly he will be questioned about the administration’s decision to use drones to target US citizens who are suspected of engaging in terrorist acts against the country.

We are at war…and war is messy.  Decisions are made at times of war that would not be made under normal circumstances.  We understand that.

But we also believe, as Oregon Senator Ron Wyden said yesterday: 

“Every American has the right to know when their government believes that it is allowed to kill them.”  

             

The Enemy Within

This is really getting old…and dangerous.

Republican Majority Leader Eric Cantor took to the podium to deliver what was billed to be a new mission statement for the party…a “re-branding” if you will.  Assigning Cantor to serve as messenger was seen as a significant sign that the party faithful had finally come to grips with their November beat down, and the turning over a new more moderate leaf was in the works.  After all Cantor had served as titular head of the radical right; leading the opposition to all things proffered by not only the president but Speaker Boehner as well.  Could his mere presence in this setting be a sign that we were about to see a new kinder gentler Republican Party?

Not so much!

In the end Cantor’s remarks were little more than same old, same old.  While Cantor did give a tepid endorsement to the Dream Act, the rest of is oratory was like re-gifting an ugly sweater…same ugly sweater…just a different colored bow on the box.

The president also found his way to the podium yesterday.  He too delivered the same tune he’s been playing but with a slightly different pitch. 

The president is concerned about the sequestration cuts that are set to automatically kick in on March 1^st.  He is concerned that these drastic cuts to important government programs and services will have a negative effect on a weak economy.  And he doesn’t believe that Washington has time between now and March 1^st to cobble together a grand bargain of spending cuts and revenue increases necessary to fix our economic woes. 

You may recall that these are the same draconian cuts that were put in place to incentivize congress to come together on a comprehensive debt reduction package.  They are the same cuts that were to go into effect on 12/31 of last year but were pushed back to March 1^st to allow congress more time to craft an agreement.

 Since congress has once again failed to do its job; the president is proposing that congress pass a much smaller package for a temporary fix and push the big spending debate even further down the road.  As usual, the president was less than forthcoming about the specific spending cuts and tax reform components that he envisions as part of this temporary plan; preferring to let his Republican opponents to take the political hit for speaking the truth.

In other words what we have here is the same old Washington cocktail…one part ideology, one part gotcha politics, two parts gridlock and a dash of job preservation.

We have heard a lot of talk lately about gun control and immigration reform.  The president has been out on the stump throwing all of his political weight behind these issues.

What we don’t hear a lot of talk about anymore is jobs.  What was once the centerpiece of the presidential campaign is now lost in the cacophony of political noise.  While congress and the White House chase the latest shiny object people are still suffering, jobs are still being lost, homes are still being foreclosed, gas is more expensive, food is more expensive, health care costs are still prohibitive for most Americans and our out of control spending continues to threaten our economic future.

If we were to be attacked by a foreign power as we were on 9/11…if al Qaida, or Iran or China were to were to threaten  our shores…we would set our political differences aside and band to together as one country to fight a common foe.  Politics and gamesmanship would all be set aside to defeat an enemy that threatens the very survival of our union.

Why can’t we find that same common ground to defeat an economic foe that is poised to inflict just as much damage to our society as any foreign nation ever could?

America’s real enemy does not reside on some distant shore. 

America’s most dangerous enemy is us.            

          

Obama Walking Slippery Slope Authorizing Drone Attacks Against Americans

NBC NEWS has obtained access to a secret Justice Department memo that lays out a startling legal basis for authorizing drone strikes on American citizens.  The memo concludes that the US government can authorize the killing of Americans citizens if they are believed to be “senior operational leaders” of al Qaida or “an associated force “even if there is no intelligence indicating they are engaged in an active plot to attack the United States.  The memo offers what NBC NEWS refers to as an “expansive definition of self defense and imminent attack” in making the legal case for targeting American citizens.

NBC NEWS has posted the entire 16 page document on its website.

Let’s cut to the chase here.

The Obama Justice Department has provided the president with a biased legal opinion that authorizes him to target American citizens without allowing the individual(s) the opportunity for due process afforded all Americans.  It states that the president may order such an attack even though there is no evidence that the individual has planned or is actively planning an attack on the US.  It further states the individual may be targeted for associating with other individuals who may have planned or may be actively planning attacks on the country.  And it places the burden of proof as to guilt or innocence on the targeted individual.

This sounds, or perhaps more appropriately smells, an awful lot like the biased legal opinions crafted by the Bush Justice Department that handed “W” the authorization to use “enhanced interrogation techniques” on Qaida prisoners.

We felt Bush violated domestic and international laws then and we are not so certain that Obama isn’t violating our laws now.  This is a very slippery slope that needs to be investigated thoroughly.

The law is the law…and holding a president accountable should NOT be based on who we supported at the polls.

Kudos to Michael Isikoff and NBC NEWS for breaking this story.       

    

This & That!

In 1999 NRA Executive Director Wayne LaPierre said that the NRA supported universal background checks for all gun purchases.  “No loopholes for anybody” he said.  This past weekend LaPierre said that there was no point to implementing universal background checks because the bad guys are just going to work their way around the law.“It’s a fraud to call them universal background checks” LaPierre said, “because the criminals aren’t going to comply with them.”  That’s like saying that there is no reason to have laws against murder because the bad guys are still going to kill people.  Why bother!  LaPierre’s argument is ridiculous.  91% of Americans, including law abiding gun owners, want background checks implemented on all gun purchases.  LaPierre and the NRA leadership are on the wrong side of this debate…and they know it.

Pulitzer Prize winning economist and bestselling author Paul Krugman is making the rounds hawking his book, “End This Depression Now.”  Naturally he has been asked about his views on current economic conditions and the steps the government should take to right the ship.  Krugman argues that all this talk about debt and deficit is much a due about nothing.  He says that long term debt is something that we can worry about later.  He says that the government’s focus should be on creating growth through additional stimulus via investing in infrastructure, education and research.  While we agree with Krugman’s views on the short term we wonder why we can’t take steps to address the long term needs as well.  Everyone knows that Medicare and Medicaid are the biggest components of our long term debt issues.  Everyone knows that as currently configured these programs cannot sustain the coming onslaught of aging baby boomers whose claims will swamp the system.  Some say the programs have only ten years of solvency remaining.  Yet Krugman seems to be encouraging  Washington to do the very thing that has brought gridlock to governing…why do today what you can put off until tomorrow.  Our elected leaders have proven their unwillingness to tackle difficult problems until the cost of procrastinating reaches disastrous proportions.  Given their recent history it would seem prudent for us to demand that congress address both short term growth and long term deficit control as one big “Grand Bargain.”  Maybe if congress starts now they can find a solution by 2023.

The US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia recently ruled that the president violated the constitution in filling Nation Labor Relations Board vacancies by recess appointment.  For the past 90 years president have used recess appointments to bypass Senate approval to install administrative personnel.  The president used recess appointments to place three board members on the NLRB.  If the ruling stands roughly 200 NLRB decisions could be declared invalid as the board failed to have a quorum save for the now illegally appointed board members.  But the big story here is the effect the Court’s ruling has on the recent activities of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, since its director, Richard Cordray, was installed as a recess appointment.  The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is the cornerstone of the Dodd-Frank financial reform law, which was enacted to eliminate the questionable banking activities that brought down the banking system.  Without the CFPB, Dodd-Frank has no power. And without a director, neither does the CFPB.  Republicans hate Dodd-Frank and so it comes as no surprise that Senate Republicans are threatening to filibuster Cordray’s appointment.  Republicans have never been able to put forward a salient answer as to why the banking system failed under the Bush Administration. So they use obfuscation and obstruction to cloud over their culpability.    If Republicans don’t like Dodd-Frank they should put forth a viable alternative instead of playing these political games.

The DOW Jones industrial average closed above 14,000 on Friday for the first time since 2007.  This good news is tempered by the fact the there are 2.5 million less jobs in this country than there were five years ago.  And while Wall Street is making millions, middle class workers have seen their average income decrease.  This information poses a number of questions.  If the DOW is over 14,000 points, having doubled since 2007, why do Republicans say that this president is bad for business?  Why is he hated by Wall Street?  Why is there any doubt that there is an ever increasing disconnect between the haves and the have not’s?  And why do Republicans scoff at Warren Buffett when he says that he never met an investor who when facing an opportunity to make money spent any time worrying about impending changes in tax rates?